Inheritor of the Tinker's Will
by TheVoiceOfNearSanity
Summary: When Buddy Pines finds a flash drive containing a specific story that fateful night, the future is altered completely. Now chasing his dream of becoming a superhero from a new angle, Buddy seeks to grow in his own right. Some other Worm elements. Defiant!Buddy.
1. Inspiration 1

Buddy Pine trudged down the street, rubbing his sore posterior. Why couldn't Mr. Incredible make him the number one fan? He wanted to be awesome like him, he wanted to fight crime and kick butt. He knew everything a child could learn about the man. He tried his hardest to prove his worth, but every time he got rejected, and today's ejector seat incident was the worst by far, but he'd try again to prove himself later today. His rocket boots were nearly finished, and tonight he would help his mentor as _Incrediboy_ , hero of justice. As he raised his clenched fist to his chest at the thought, a skittering noise grabbed his attention. It didn't sound like a pebble, no, it sounded more metallic. Looking down he saw just in front of his feet a small black flash drive, with a metal protector around the main casing. Glancing around the side street he was walking on, he couldn't see anyone close enough to have dropped it, so he would have to search it to determine the owner. Finally, he could be a real hero! Elated at his new detective mission, an act of heroism to return someone's potentially valuable lost property, Buddy picked up speed, sprinting for home.

Buddy sat down in front of his workbench placing the thumb drive gently on the desk in front of him. Next to him sat his personal laptop, kludged together from a variety of computers and scrap electronics, he had built it himself. Despite being a bit bulkier than the average laptop, weighing in at about six pounds, it had several times the processing power and a custom wireless router built in, giving Buddy internet access almost anywhere in the city. Despite being designed for portable use, Buddy never took the thing outside, after his previous model was "accidentally" destroyed by some classmates of his. Booting the machine up, Buddy took a few moments to set up some security precautions, just in case the drive was trapped with a virus. Satisfied that his precious machine, filled with designs that would help him finally be appointed Mr. Incredible's sidekick, would be safe from anything on the drive, he plugged it in and ran a scan.

* * *

Well that was disappointing.

Instead of top secret data, extensive sets of photographs, or anything a child's imagination could have come up with, there were a few documents. Again, disappointing. Buddy scrolled over the first document, right clicking to bring up the details, while running a few background checks to see if anything was unusual. With a ping, the computer announced its results, a standard word document, written in twelve point font, with 1,600,000 words, nothing unusual there… 'Wait, what was that word count again?', snapping back to attention Buddy double checked the readout and confirmed that yes, this document had more pages than most novels put together, and was stored entirely on the flash drive. His curiosity piqued, Buddy decided to open the document.

 _Worm, a Web Serial,_ by Wildbow

'An interesting title' Buddy thought as he began to read the document, a background search scouring the internet for any references to the author.

Two hours later, Buddy's program had not turned up anything, but he could care less, because he was too engrossed in the novel. The words struck a chord with him. Hearing his mother knocking on the door, Buddy shut his laptop and climbed to bed, the words of the few chapters he had finished echoing in his head.

* * *

Over the next two weeks, Buddy continued his search for the strange author of _Worm_ , while reading a few chapters every day after school. By the end of the first week, he finally called the search off, having posted a few things on prominent message boards to no response and not found anything in his searches. Granted, this incident with Mr. Incredible and a jumper was taking up a good chunk of the front page, but he should have heard something. As far as he could tell, the author simply didn't exist. Despite his failure in his search for the author, he found success in his endeavors to read the novel. And as he closed the document after reading the last line, he moved on to the other documents, which turned out to be extra knowledge, packets of background information that would not have slotted into the story, but provided even more data for his hungry mind. The next day, having read everything the hard drive had to offer, he leaned back in his chair.

Where once he had been an aspiring fan hoping to be like the heroes of his world, now he understood new things that had never been considered before. In Metro City and many others like it, heroic capes, he elected to use the new term, generally fell into the physical classifications of powers, such as brutes, blasters, movers, and breakers. There were a smaller population of changers, strikers, and shakers, but on the mental or meta levels there was nothing. There were none of the perception and mind-altering powers of strangers and masters, none of the incredible skills and precognition of thinkers, and certainly none of the sheer power versatility and cape-countering strength of trumps. Hell, even the capes that had powers reminiscent of strangers, such as invisibility, tended to be better classified as breakers as they altered light around them, not perception. But one classification intrigued him, that of the tinker. Tinkers were not acknowledged as a cape classification in his world, and for some reason a majority of villains fit the classification, but no heroes did. A recent example was the French expy of Bakuda, Bomb Voyage, whom Mr. Incredible had tangled with the night he found the flash drive. He gazed over at his prototype rocket boots, seeing them in a new light. He had learned from the novel, and he would take those teachings to heart, becoming his world's first heroic tinker.

The capes taught him of the unwritten rules, they taught him of strength and adaptability.

From the iron will of the PRT and Coil's men he learned that even an unpowered could fight a cape and win.

From the informant Tattletale he learned the value of information and its applications.

From the kind A.I. Dragon he learned how to make the best of a horrible situation you are forced into.

From the Triumvirate he learned that the greatest paragons to the public are not necessarily quite so pure behind the scenes.

From Glenn Chambers he learned the value of good PR and how it shaped your cape career.

From the Undersiders he learned the value of having a team and companionship, no matter how dysfunctional.

From Jessica Yamada he learned the value and power of an expert Psychologist.

From the S9 he learned what true monsters were.

And from Skitter, he learned the four most important lessons: first, no matter how weak a power may seem, you can still win with enough creativity, second, sometimes one must do the wrong thing for the right reasons, third, always fight to survive and your costume should reflect that to some degree, and fourth, no matter how high you go or powerful you are, you're so very small, in the end.

He stood from his chair and walked to his desk, the rocket boots having gathered a thin film of dust over them. He set them to the side and began to draw a new set of blueprints.

He would no longer seek to become _Incrediboy,_ no, he would take up a mantle made in another world, not that of Hero, the first tinker, but rather the one his apprentice assumed to fight again after losing the one he first chose in greed and shame.

Buddy would become Defiant, the first tinker of his world, the one who stood up and said that a hero could be an inventor, and he would show them what a hero forged from the fragments of a hellish world was made of.

* * *

 **Author's Note: This is only my second fic, and more of a post to see how the idea is** **received. Right now, I have a different fic I need to work on, so this probably won't update for a while.**

 **Please read, rate, and review, I want to know what you all think.**


	2. Inspiration 2

Buddy sat at his lab table, staring at the chemical formula in his notebook. He was so close, he knew it! If he could only get the thermal pore structure to work, he would be able to mimic containment foam perfectly! He already had developed a substance that proved impossibly sticky and could be fired in projectile form, but it couldn't double as a fire suppressant, and if someone were incased in the stuff, he would have to worry about suffocation. So he was up late on a school night, again, trying to get the formula to click in his head. Sighing, he leaned back in his desk chair and looked around his room.

Over the past several years, his room had changed greatly. Gone were the Mr. Incredible posters and action figures, replaced by gadgets and tools. His room looked unlike that of most other teenagers. To the side stood his Mark I halberd, serviced and ready for action, his bin of blueprints and technical drawings next to it. On shelves in his closet were the various components of his armor he had managed to finish, still missing the main power supply and powered exoskeleton that would tie it all together. Along two of the four walls were handmade worktables, cobbled together from bits of scrap metal over the years. If there was one positive thing he could say about the lack of tinkers in his world, it would be that it made scavenging scrap much safer and easier, with no one watching the junkyards on lookout to press-gang him. He also had a fair amount of store-bought technologies. It was surprising what you could buy with a high school allowance when you were spending almost all of it on your tinkering. Most of his worktables were covered in fabrication machines, with the worktable he was at possessing a small chemical lab and a fume hood he rigged up himself.

Guessing that he wouldn't crack the formula that night, and acknowledging that he needed sleep to get through school awake the next day, Buddy stood up and went to bed, catching a glimpse of himself in his mirror as he passed. Years of martial arts training and conditioning had melted away his baby fat, his muscles swelling into a true athletic build. As he had learned, a good cape indulges in physical fitness, even if they were not a frontline fighter, as they could become one at any moment. He himself had trained in quite a few martial arts, not only learning extensive hand-to-hand combat skills, but also mastering various forms of weaponry, especially his weapon of choice, the halberd. Sighing at his lack of work that night, he laid down on his bed and went to sleep.

* * *

Woken by the chirping of his alarm, Buddy got dressed and began to pack for the day. Into his bag went his school books, his school supplies, his drafting notebook, and his drafting instruments. Walking over to his halberd, he broke it down into three sections and popped off the blades. Sliding the poles into a side pocket of his bag and setting the blades to the side, he then went to his closet and extracted a few odds and ends, along with his collapsed helmet and visor. Making sure to synch the latter with his new computer, he double checked his equipment and headed down for breakfast. While he might not officially patrol as a hero, he made sure to keep some of his tech on himself at all times for an emergency. After finishing his ham and eggs, he brushed his teeth and headed for the bus. Slipping into a seat near the back, he took out his notebook and began to doodle.

School that day was the same as usual, his peers getting ticked at him for knowing all the answers, the teachers getting on his case for slacking off, even though both parties knew he was years ahead of the material. He stretched his stiff joints as he walked out the front door, skipping the bus line, as he had to pick up some components for his research into containment foam. His route to the post office took him by the bank. Remembering that his wallet was running a bit low on daily funds, usually money he spent when he had to buy scrap from the junkyard or a flea market, he decided to head inside.

Five minutes later, Buddy was seriously wondering what it was with bank robberies in this city, as three masked goons decided that broad daylight was the perfect time to rob the place. What he later found even more amusing when he looked it up was that today was the worst possible day of the week for a bank heist, as the tills were at their lowest point yet. Still, there was a robbery in front of him, he had just finished his business at the teller so he could leave when he was done, and the goons hadn't noticed him yet. Slipping into a corner, he toggled a jamming device in his backpack, disabling the security cameras so that way his identity would not be compromised. To further this goal, he removed his emergency raincoat from his backpack and put it on over his shirt. Taking out the light duffel bag he brought to carry his parcel in, he stuffed his school bag into that to hide it and slung the duffel over his shoulder. Clicking out the segments to his halberd, currently more of a quarterstaff, and unfolding his helmet, he slipped back through the crowd and scanned the situation once more.

The goons had ganged up on the two tellers, who were currently shifting money from the till to canvas sacks the goons had brought. The goons were lightly armed, by his standards, with all of them carrying poor-quality pistols and decently maintained knives. With civilians in the line of fire and his own armor back home, Buddy knew he had to work fast. Dropping into a crouch, he lowered his staff and pulled a trigger on the grip, sending small black pellets towards the feet of one of the goons. The second after he fired, he shoved the last person in front of him away, and sprinted towards the goons himself, engaging the stun feature of his "halberd". The goon he had shot at, his feet now encased in sticky black spheres, was the first to go down, an electrified strike to a minor nerve cluster dropping him in seconds. Buddy spun through and brought his baton around to bear on the second goon, who had crossed his arms in an effort to block the strike. The stun feature dropped him to the ground, and a quick follow-up made sure he stayed there. The appearance of a red line on his HUD alerted Buddy that the final goon had raised his pistol and was readying a shot. Spinning on his heel, buddy brought the staff around under the gun barrel, forcing it to the ceiling, just as two loud barks sounded from it, plaster raining down on the crowd behind him. With a scraping of metal on metal, Buddy ran his staff along the underside of the gun barrel and then jerked it sideways into the ganger's head, pulling the stun trigger the moment the strike connected. His work done, Buddy turned around and bolted for the exit, ducking into alleyways to lose any pursuers he might have had. Once he was sure he was unobserved, he changed back into what he had worn before, and set off for the post office. He had a package to pick up and homework and tinkering to do, regardless of any crimes he happened to stop on the way. He wasn't quite to Protectorate level, not yet, and he wanted to be an adult before he would even attempt to go out on his first official patrol.

Mulling his thoughts over in his head, they took a surprising tangent. Five minutes later, he was outside the post office, his package forgotten as he furiously scribbled edits into his containment foam formula. This one would work, he knew it!

* * *

 **Author's Note:**

 **Thank you all for the positive reception, I hope I can continue to live up to your expectations.**

 **Anyways, most of my work is on classwork and my other story, so updates will be closer to whenever I decide to write them.**

 **As always, please read, rate, and review.**


	3. Inspiration 3

Defiant's motorcycle roared through the streets of downtown, the road in front of him illuminated by a single high-powered LED lamp. The onboard fusion reactor hummed beneath his legs, as the synthetic tires ate up the distance beneath him. Tonight was his first night out on a real patrol, and it seemed pretty quiet. A chirp from his onboard radio signaled he had an incoming call. Flicking his eyes to the corner of his H.U.D. for a second to pick up the call, he decelerated a bit and pulled to the side of the road.

"Hey Honey, how's the weather in Metro City?"

"It's nice Rae, clear night, nothing so far. I'll give it two more hours then come home."

"Ok, I'll make sure Dragon makes you something to grab before bed. Call me when you're on your way back. Bye!"

"Bye."

*click*

Defiant chucked to himself as he turned onto a side street to continue his patrol route, scanning the shopfronts before him as he cruised along. While the headlight helped, his night vision cameras did just as much. The headlight was so that other drivers knew where he was and didn't accidentally hit him. His radio crackled to life with a quick burst of static before solidifying into a clear female voice.

"Defiant, parahuman crime two miles from your location, sending route to your HUD."

An illuminated track appeared before him, as he gunned the engine to race along it. Traffic was light at this hour, but a quick glance at his map indicated he would have to briefly drive on the highway.

"Copy that, Dragon, moving to respond. Situation report."

"Local cell phone footage and police radio indicate villain known as "Blister" is attempting to rob an armored car transport for some of the local businesses. Police are on scene but are being forced back."

"Capabilities?"

"Blister is rated as Blaster 6, Mover 4, Shaker 3 currently. Powers are exploding fireballs, low velocity flight, and a thermal aura with a radius of about 2 meters."

"Copy that, current ETA for myself and police backup?"

"Five minutes for yourself, ten for police."

"Thank you, Dragon, see you on the other side."

"Good luck Defiant."

The radio cut out with a *click*. As he raced to the crime scene Defiant mulled over how he was finally going to accomplish his dream since he was a kid. Over the years he had developed many amazing and wondrous devices, some of which he sold to raise funds for his own heroing. His policy on sold technology was to make it just like _Worm_ Tinkertech, heavily black boxed to prevent replicability, and with a very short shelf life. Though his two greatest moments were his creation of Dragon, and his marrying of Rae. He was jolted from his reverie by the sound of an explosion up ahead. Seeing the light of the blasts and the glow of police sirens, he prepared to engage. He slipped his Halberd off his back and into his right hand, and ran a quick diagnostic on his armor. Finding it satisfactory, he checked his containment foam levels and made sure he had a bottle of dissolving solution to give to the police. Finally, he cycled the magazine on his dart launcher to tranquilizer.

Preparations complete, and arriving on the scene, he brought the bike screeching to a halt and leaped off. Currently Blister was hovering about three meters off the ground and dual wielding his fireballs, using one hand to lob them at the police and force them to cover, and the other to blast the doors of the van, which were already glowing red and heavily dented. His heat aura was keeping the police at range and blurred his exact position, making shooting him even more difficult. As he saw Defiant run up he chucked a fireball at him, which whizzed overhead and exploded behind him.

Wasting no time, Defiant leapt into action, his boots pounding against the pavement as his armor's servos whined. He jinked left, then right to dodge the next two fireballs launched at him, just managing to escape their blast radii. Pressing a switch on his halberd, a small sphere appeared at the tip, connected to a long, thin chain. The sphere expanded to about the size of a softball, as Defiant began to twirl the end, spinning the now-deployed flail around his head. With a few quick eye movements, he adjusted the mass for knockback, and swung the flail right into the haze. While he couldn't see much using the electromagnetic spectrum due to the heat haze, his suit also had a sonar suite, so he knew roughly where his opponent was. The end whistled through the air, before sending Blister flying with a *whump*. While Blister was stunned, Defiant closed the distance, and clicked the end of his halberd down, forming a stock, while a pistol grip and trigger slid down from the center. Sighting along the rear spike, he double checked the ammo he was using, then fired a tranquilizer dart into the center of the haze. A quick cry of pain echoed and Blister's outline flinched, before the haze faded, revealing the exact location a sleeping Blister.

"Son, I'm going to need you to step away from the criminal with your hands on your head."

Defiant turned around to see an entire line of cops pointing their weapons at him, one of them behind the lines wielding a megaphone.

"Might I ask why?"

"That was very reckless of you, plus I'm pretty sure that counts as assault and battery."

"That would be nice, but according to the Atlas Act of 1985, I was well within my rights to do so."

"Son, that law only applies to Supers, and after the Metahuman Ban, I can't see how you could get out of this either way."

"Easily, actually. The Atlas Act allows any 'person of sufficient strength so as to exceed that of present law enforcement' to aid in the stopping of a crime. However, the Metahuman Ban only applies to persons with 'abilities beyond the scope of human physiology'. Officer, under my armor, I'm just a really intelligent and well-trained human, carrying around enough equipment to provide me with enough strength to be counted under the Atlas Act. So I'll leave Blister in your capable hands, and I'll be on my way."

"Ok. Boys, let him through."

"Yes, sir."

As the officers lowered their weapons and approached the sleeping blister, Defiant turned back to the sergeant.

"The tranquilizer should wear off in about an hour and has no known side effects."

The officer nodded, then spoke up,

"Son, what's your name?"

"Defiant."

And with that, Defiant mounted his motorcycle and resumed his patrol.

* * *

One and a Half Hours Later:

Defiant rode his motorcycle up a metal ramp and into the hull of a small jet, its engine outlets angled downwards for landing. As he stoped and got off, metal clamps emerged from the floor and secured the bike. Taking off his helmet as the ramp raised itself behind him and the engines roared to life, he walked through the doors at the front of the cargo bay and into a small suite.

The female voice from earlier chirped, "Good evening, Defiant."

"Good evening to you too Dragon, what's our estimated arrival time?"

"Current projections put us arriving at Nomanisan Island by 11:00 p.m. At your wife's request, I have prepared you a light meal before bed. She also insists that you call her as soon as possible."

"Thank you, Dragon, I'm going to do that as soon as I get my armor off."

Pulling a small lever by his hip, Defiant reached around to a second panel that opened up near his armpit and pressed a release switch there. With a whir of servos and a slight hydraulic hiss, the front of the armor unfolded like a work of origami, allowing William, formerly Buddy, Pines, aspiring hero, to step out. Freed from his armor, and with robotic arms securing it in the corner, Robert took a seat by the table and pulled up a holographic screen. Tapping in a password and number, he listened to the ringing of the phone.

"Hey Will, are you done for the night, and did anything interesting come up?"

"Yep, Dragon says I'll be back around eleven. There wasn't much tonight, mostly a few robberies and muggings I stepped in on, the only big event being a mid-ranked blaster trying to rob an armored car."

"Really? Which one?"

"Blister, you can look him up later, plus I've got an idea for new defenses I can install on the Island from how his attacks worked."

"That's nice dear, do remember to come out of your lab once in a while."

"I could say the same to you, see you at 11. Love you."

"Love you too, bye."

William relaxed back in the chair.

He dreamily thought, 'How did I ever manage to get a girl like her.'

His thoughts wandered back to when they first met, back in his Sophomore year in College. Both of them were studying engineering, with her planning to continue on to medical school. Both of them were in the same advanced chemistry class. He met her early on in the year, when no one else wanted to do labs with them. As the year wore on, they grew closer together, and she opened up to him, explaining why no one interacted with her. She had always been obsessed with medicine, reading everything she could get her hands on. Her parents had separated when she was younger, and she moved between their houses. One day, while she was at her father's house, he suffered an attack of a rare medical condition, collapsing to the floor. She called 911 and tried CPR, but was unable to get it to work. Remembering everything she knew, and realizing that CPR wouldn't be able to work in this situation, she leapt into action. As she told her tale, William was reminded very much of the biotinker Bonesaw. Much like Bonesaw, she was left alone in a house, forced to do something she never tried before to save the only family there. Rae wound up saving her father's life, but permanently disfigured him in the process. Word got out to her classmates, and being the children they were, they criticized her for it, isolating her. She thought she would have a new start in college, but another student from her school came with her, and the rumor mill started up again. As she moved to continue, William cut her off, and told her his own story. Like her he was also isolated because of something he did with his intellect. He told her stories of how he had had few friends in high school and even fewer now, because he spent so much of his time working on his tech. They continued to swap stories, which then turned to talking shop on chemical compounds. Over the years, they dated, then eventually married after college, moving to Nomanisan a couple years later, once William's tech business really took off.

He had shown her the story of Worm and told her of his dream. Surprisingly, she decided to hero together with him, taking up the mantle of Chirurgeon, the surgeon without peer.

* * *

 **Author's Note: So I realized it had been a while and I decided to update. I don't like how the ending turned out completely, but I needed some exposition. I'm going to put the same warning I did over on my first fic, my writing usually gets worse as a story goes on, be ready in case that happens.**

 **So yeah, Buddy gets a teammate. I decided to bring over four to five capes from Worm, Dragon, Defiant, Bonesaw, Kid Win, and possibly String Theory. With the latter two being Robert and Rae's kids, because if the Incredibles can be a super family, so too can the tinkers.**

 **As always, please read, rate and review.**


End file.
